The societal risk of trying to create a pedigree super race

With the exception of low-level body-hacking, transhumanism is an expensive business. From
genetic modification and cryonics to robo-prosthetics and smart drugs, it's the playground of the privileged. But if
a wealthy pioneer chooses to genetically engineer their perfect
sproglet, who picks up the bill when it all goes wrong? And at what
point does a perceived enhancement become so popular that it
becomes the norm?

These are questions that sociologist Steve Fuller is concerned with. "The biggest problem is not
about going beyond human nature. It's social justice," he told
Wired.co.uk. "In the future we're going to have to start seeing
these enhancements as things people should be able to have access
to on medical insurance."

He believes that as people experiment with more enhancements,
there is an impact on human identity as a whole, since the notion
of enhancement relies on our understanding of what it means to be
physically or mentally "normal". This understanding, in turn,
informs discussions about discrimination and justice. For example,
according to the Equality Act 2010, businesses that provide a
service to the public must make reasonable adjustments to their
premises to give disabled access. What happens if bionic retinas with night vision or augmented reality becomes
the norm? Should there be NHS provisions for the minority that
don't have access to the technology?

Furthermore, what happens if technological advances in
prosthetics and exoskeletons mean that we no longer see what we
currently perceive as disability in the same way? "At the moment
construction issues around disability [disability parking spaces
etc] presuppose that it's an unfortunate thing."

Fuller points out that it's misguided to see transhumanism as a
simple matter of individual choice since it has the potential to
have a major impact on public policy and welfare provision. "We
need to keep track of the kind of choices people are making. And if
we are going to encourage it, we need to make it possible for
everyone to have the opportunity to be involved."

In this context he mentions cocktails of drugs that improve
cognitive function and longevity -- something we are already seeing
to a certain degree with the likes of human growth hormone, used by ageing Hollywood stars to keep
muscle mass.

Other areas include the tabloid-provoking "designer baby" idea.
He is keen to point out that it's highly unlikely to be possible to
have a menu of options for a particular IQ, eye and hair colour.
"It will be about influencing particular genes or clusters of genes
that will be statistically related to certain traits. But these
things can have unexpected consequences."

"The worry isn't simply that the rich people will be able to
create a super race, rather it's the degree of risk and uncertainty
that you are exposing society to," he argues.

"It's just like pedigree dogs.
Are we going to be able to afford collectively the consequences of
this? Really you are encouraging greater risk-taking in
general."

Given the degree to which the welfare state has been cut back
over the last few years, these sorts of developments have come at
an unfortunate time. Clearly, we are a long way off before we can
engineer the perfect athlete, but there are dabblings with
biohacking and smart drugs taking place with little consideration
for societal consequences.

"If you are concerned about social justice, the state is going
to have to pick up the tab. So far transhumanists see it entirely
in individualistic terms -- but there's collective consequences for
society," he says.

Fuller believes that there needs to be a global strategy to
address this, but that we shouldn't create overly stringent ethical
guidelines that hound researchers out of certain countries:
experiments simply need to be closely monitored. "If you ban
it in one country, it will go somewhere else and no one will find
out about it. There will be Islands of Dr Moreau springing up all
over the place."

Comments

super humans sounds cool, but obviously the rich will make sure its not accessible to everyone, now thats not really the issue, but the utmost concern is horrendous possibilities of disastrous consequences, some reactions will be visible from the onstate and some will probably surface after years.

I think this mission will create that atmosphere of fear in the society, where by we are living with altered humans which we are not really familiar with what their reactions could be.

Humans always bite more than they can chew, perform your experiments on animals but don't do it on humans remember humans can recreate and you wont be able to handle what comes out of this science madness of yours.